Posted on 09/25/2005 4:44:09 PM PDT by Happy2BMe
September 26, 2005 · I believe that a little outrage can take you a long way.
I remember the exact moment when I discovered outrage as a kind of fuel. It was about 1980. I was 17, the daughter of Bolivian immigrants growing up in suburban Detroit. After a dinner table conversation with my family about the wars going on in Central America and the involvement of the United States (my country by birth and my parents' country by choice), a good friend said the thing that set me off. He told me that he thought the U.S. might someday go to war somewhere in Latin America. He looked me in the eye and told me that if it happens, he believes my parents belong in an internment camp just like the Japanese-Americans during World War II.
Now this was someone who knew us, who had sat at our table and knew how American we are. We are a little exotic maybe, but it never occurred to me that we were anything but an American family. For my friend, as for many others, there will always be doubt as to whether we really belong in this country, which is our home, enough doubt to justify taking away our freedom. My outrage that day became the propellant of my life, driving me straight to the civil rights movement, where I've worked ever since.
I guess outrage got me pretty far. I found jobs in the immigrant rights movement. I moved to Washington to work as an advocate. I found plenty more to be angry about along the way and built something of a reputation for being strident. Someone once sent my mom an article about my work. She was proud and everything but wanted to know why her baby was described as "ferocious."
Anger has a way, though, of hollowing out your insides. In my first job, if we helped 50 immigrant families in a day, the faces of the five who didn't qualify haunted my dreams at night. When I helped pass a bill in Congress to help Americans reunite with their immigrant families, I could only think of my cousin who didn't qualify and who had to wait another decade to get her immigration papers.
It's like that every day. You have victories but your defeats outnumber them by far, and you remember the names and faces of those who lost. I still have the article about the farm worker who took his life after we lost a political fight. I have not forgotten his name – and not just because his last name was the same as mine. His story reminds me of why I do this work and how little I can really do.
I am deeply familiar with that hollow place that outrage carves in your soul. I've fed off of it to sustain my work for many years. But it hasn't eaten me away completely, maybe because the hollow place gets filled with other, more powerful things like compassion, faith, family, music, the goodness of people around me. These things fill me up and temper my outrage with a deep sense of gratitude that I have the privilege of doing my small part to make things better.
He told me that he thought the U.S. might someday go to war somewhere in Latin America.He looked me in the eye and told me that if it happens, he believes my parents belong in an internment camp just like the Japanese-Americans during World War II.
Cecilia Munoz is vice president of the Office of Research, Advocacy and Legislation at the National Council of La Raza.Born in Detroit to Bolivian immigrants, she has worked on behalf of Hispanic-Americans. Munoz was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2000.
You have to wonder if she can find a big enough hat, though.
"But it hasn't eaten me away completely, maybe because the hollow place gets filled with..."
Boilerplate leftist nonsense, no doubt.
She's in good company . .
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you all for coming. Thanks for coming. Thanks for the warm welcome. Thanks for joining me as I make this important announcement, an announcement that I believe will make America a more compassionate, more humane and stronger country.
I appreciate members of my Cabinet who have joined me today, starting with our secretary of state, Colin Powell.
(APPLAUSE)
I'm honored that our attorney general, John Ashcroft, has joined us.
(APPLAUSE)
Secretary of Commerce Don Evans.
(APPLAUSE)
Secretary Tom Ridge of the Department of Homeland Security, I'm honored you're here.
BUSH: El Embajador de Mexico Tony Garza.
(APPLAUSE)
I thank all the other members of my administration who joined us today. I appreciate the Members of Congress who've taken time to come, Senator Larry Craig, Congressman Chris Cannon and Congressman Jeff Flake.
I'm honored you all have joined us. Thank you for coming.
I appreciate the members of citizen groups who've joined us today, chairman of the Hispanic Alliance For Progress, Mani Luhan (ph); Gil Moreno, the president and CEO of the Association for the Advancement of Mexican-Americans; Roberta Deposada, the president of the Latino Coalition; and Hector Flores, the president of LULAC.
(Note her position in LULAC from the article. SMTA)
A sad plea for professional help. Hope she gets it.
I suppose he thinks that if we go to war with the country of his ancestors, his family should be thrown in an internment camp as well.
What a bigoted jerk.
IMO, this piece should be labelled with a "Vanity" tag.
'Para la Gente'
This woman is gross.
Very similar minset to the ACLU and NAACP.
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